Hi to all, here is my next project, the massive Dora kit. I always wanted one since I saw the add on the pages of finescale modeler, but the price was too high. Then it got even more expensive due to its shipping weight. Finally after 8 years my dream came true, I Got it for $560 including shipping from Germany and Here it is, 35+ pounds of plastic, 3200+ parts including PH and aluminum rails.

I’m a happy modeler
Compared to a tiger box
Also have the excellent book by Mr. Taube for reference, the decals from peddinghaus
And the aluminum shells from Mr. Schatton
Here the giant shell compared to a trumpeter figure body
Opening the big box you encounter the instruction book and five boxes numbered 2-6.
Each box has its number and the information of the bags inside and the parts inside each bag
Here are some of the boxes and its parts, all the boxes are full to the top
And the bag of screws
Each bag has all the info on its contents and the box it belongs to
So the work started by fixing one of the mayor problems on the kit, the cars, they did 4
Long cars instead of the 8 smaller cars that Dora had. It will be impossible to turn in a real radius with the cars as they come. So to fix it you have to cut the cars in half ending
With 8 five axle cars, two for each end of the main mount.

Here the sides and top parts of one of the cars ready to be cut

Attached Thumbnails

__________________
"Don't be afraid of the model,it's you the one holding the knife"

After all the parts are cut it looks like this
First you cut in the center, then cut again each side to approximate 2-3mm to compensate
For movement.
Then I removed what is left of the ring from each half and sanded the area smooth

Next is the assembly of the brake system and wheels, its a million parts for this area
All the sprues for the brakes and wheels
80 wheels and 40 axles
And all the parts cleaned and ready to install

That’s all for now as soon as the cars are ready I will post the photos
Thanks for watching
[attachment=10241]he721067.jpg[/attachment]

Attached Thumbnails

__________________
"Don't be afraid of the model,it's you the one holding the knife"

Hi Bugbear, yes its a big gun, still deciding where Im going to display it when finished. The tiger I got it on ebay, I was bidding on one and thingking I was not going to win it I bid on a second One, ended wining both for 100 each. I keep both for a couple of moths and finally sold the second one on ebay, and for my surprice it sold for 200 so I can say the one I kept was for free. Now this are hard to find and very expensive .

Abdin

__________________
"Don't be afraid of the model,it's you the one holding the knife"

Hi to all and thanks for your comments, here with an update on the Dora, work continues on the 8 cars brake system and wheels.

The brake system is very detailed and has many parts making it time consuming
The wheels and axles are cleaned and ready to install
With the brakes finished I installed the sides of the car followed by the wheels, the walls snaps in to place neatly and also have bolts to secure and reinforce it.
All the parts glued in place
Next upper part of the car is detailed and the side ladders are assembled, please note that the parts position are reversed on the instructions, so part 19 goes on the upper side and 20 goes down.
The front of the car is also very detailed and the coupling mechanism is movable.
Side and top details
The other end car
This two were once a long 10 axle car, you can see the differences between each.
Now you have four of each, 4 for the front and four for the back of the main carriage.
Finally I made 8 end plates out of styrene sheet to cover the end of each car were it was cut
After the cars are finished I took a look at the aluminum rails and noticed it look oversize,
so I search on other Dora builds and confirmed the rails are too big. The rails are 8mm tall by 7.1
Wide, compared to a regular trumpeter rail that is 5 mm tall by 3.1 wide. Here you can see the
Difference in size
A trumpeter figure with the aluminum rail

__________________
"Don't be afraid of the model,it's you the one holding the knife"

And both rails
The model comes with its own base; it is nicely detailed very strong and heavy but in my opinion
The ballast is way too big
next another problem encountered is that the width between the rails is 45mm on the Dora rails, the standard rail width is 41mm in 1/35 scale. So if I’m going to use the trumpeter rails I need to modify the wheels on all the cars to fit the trumpeter track. I searched again on other old builds and this guy discovered that the inside spacer on the wheel is 2 mm Width, so by removing it the inside width can be adjusted to 41mm, yes! All this means the original base is not going to be used unless I can come with an idea of how to. So by now I will keep working with trumpeters
Now I have to carefully remove all the axles from each car to make the modification, remove 2mm from inside each wheel
So with my dremel I removed the plastic, leaving it level is exactly 2mm
Now it looks like this
All installed in place again, the wheels are dry mounted so if I want to use the original rail with the original base all you have to do is move the wheels to the side and it will be 45mm again
So I tested the car on a trumpeter track and it worked perfectly

With this the cars are finished, now I started to work on the bridges that go between each set of cars.
thanks for watching!
Abdin

__________________
"Don't be afraid of the model,it's you the one holding the knife"